Introduction Two black horses pulled a glass carriage, descending slowly through the Garw valley of south Wales, carrying the body of Private Craig Barber, age 20, of the 2nd Batallion The Royal Welsh. Barber, who had grown up in the Garw and neighbouring Ogmore valleys, had been killed two and a half weeks earlier, while driving an armoured vehicle through the city streets of Basra, Iraq. As the horse-drawn carriage and funeral procession passed through the villages of Blaengarw and Pontycymer, the streets were lined with mourners. Shops were closed, and Welsh flags hung out of windows, over doorways and in gardens. The procession paused briefly outside the homes of Barber’s grandmother and mother, before continuing to the Coychurch Crematorium in Bridgend for a military funeral. There, soldiers from Barber’s regiment carried his coffin inside, while the song, ‘Hero’ by Enrique Iglesias, was played (Dimbleby 2011; MoD 2007; Western Mail 2007; Wright 2007). Barber’s family would later set up the Craig Barber Memorial Trust, raising money in his memory ‘to support both individual soldiers and children’s groups within the communities in the Ogmore and the Garw Valley’ (CBMT 2011). In Cardiff, the Military Preparation College – a Welsh government funded military training programme where Barber had gone when he was sixteen years old, one year before he joined the army – created the Craig Barber Trophy, that it now awards every year to its most improved student. wiserd.ac.uk/files/3613/8019/7095/WISERD_WPS_009.pdf
Posted on: Fri, 31 Oct 2014 17:56:05 +0000
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